


a new kind of normal

by Skyepilot



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Canon Disabled Character, Carnival, Coulson thinks Daisy is the greatest, Drinking, Eating, F/M, Fireworks, First Kiss, First Time, Flirting, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Friendship/Love, He is right, Junk Food Is For Lovers, Making Out, Older Man/Younger Woman, Skye | Daisy Johnson's Superpowers, Small Towns, Soulmates, Speculation, Swimming Pools, Talking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-03
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-11-22 17:06:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11384601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skyepilot/pseuds/Skyepilot
Summary: For becketted's birthday.  Daisy and Coulson finally get one normal day.





	a new kind of normal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [zauberer_sirin](https://archiveofourown.org/users/zauberer_sirin/gifts).



"That look. What is that look?"

Coulson's eyes are fixed over her shoulder, and she can already hear the footsteps approaching her from behind.

Of course. The day has already gone too smoothly.

When she woke this morning, she had a slight sense of dread, staying in bed longer than usual.

It's not even her birthday, it's the day after, and they'd had no real time to celebrate, just talk about cupcakes and then everyone was wearily rolling into bed.

She'd had a nice AM workout, and a cupcake for breakfast. A few of them were already taken, probably the late crew.

Not that she was offended, she feels lucky to even _be here_. To have the team back together after they chased Coulson down.

Now he's making that face, that's telling her that luck is about to change.

"Watchdogs in a hostage situation, they're refusing to speak to anyone but Quake," Mack tells them.

He hands her the tablet as she looks over the details.

It's a trap, of course, meant to make an example of her, win or lose. Coulson's frown line between his brow is deepening by the moment.

He gives her a quiet, questioning look, because it's her call as Director.

"Tell May to pull together a tactical team and meet me in the hangar. Coulson, you stay on coms to monitor the situation."

"Right," he answers, in reply, then puts his hands on his hips.

"I'd like to have you in my ear," she tells him quietly, and puts her hand on his shoulder, as she turns to walk away with Mack.

She parts ways with him in the hall, then suits up and heads to the hanger.

As she walks up the ramp to the inside of the quinjet, she switches on her coms, nodding to the rest of the tac team.

"May, whenever your ready," she says towards the cockpit.

"Daisy," she hears Coulson's voice say. "Hope you're not in the air already."

"Status?" she wonders, her pulse starting to race. "Please don't tell me-"

"Robbie. All the hostages are safe, there's a few sobbing Watchdogs at the scene, but otherwise the local PD have it under control."

"Oh," she says, walking towards the cockpit to inform May. That sort of thing never happens.

"It's been awhile since I started Lola up," he adds wistfully, before she switches off the coms.

  
***

  
"We never get a quiet day to ourselves," he nods, eyes hidden behind his aviators as he looks at the passing scenery.

"The last time we tried normal," she jokes from behind the wheel, "You got abducted by space feds."

"I'll try to do better next time," he replies sarcastically. "Where are we going, anyway?"

"I don't know," she shrugs, looking out at the open road in front of them. "I just started driving _away_ from things."

"We didn't even get to celebrate your birthday yesterday."

He says it like he's disappointed with himself, and she has to think about it for a moment.

Usually, the universe is not this kind. Coulson is with her at least, but that doesn't mean they're anywhere close to being out of danger yet.

"Probably not too far from the base," she tells him, trying to cover over her anxiety. "In case they need us."

"They can handle it, and if we have to get involved, they can send a quinjet for us."

"Being a leader is also knowing when to let go?" she says, turning to glance at him with a half smile.

"You still worry. Just part of the job," he smiles back, his expression turning to a smirk. "Even when they're smarter and better than you."

She had missed that when he was gone. He kind of had _the lock_ on charming smirks around the base.

And how he always had a way of encouraging her that made her feel emboldened and valued at the same time.

" _Only_ smarter and better?" she teases back at the absurdity of it.

"Let me think on that," he sighs, leaning back in the seat, looking intentionally smug, when their phones both start to ring.

She knew it, of course, that it would be too good to be true.

He gestures towards her that he'll take it as she starts to pull Lola off to the side of the road.

The landscape is mostly trees and patches of open fields, but things are still green. The sun is out and it's perfect for driving with the top down.

"I'll ask her how she wants to handle it," he says, as Daisy picks up hints of Simmons' accent. It must be a medical emergency. Damn.

Then he shuts the phone off and puts it back in his pocket.

"Well?" she asks him with a shrug when he isn't immediately forthcoming.

"They put Simmons up to it and asked if they could finish off your birthday cupcakes. They weren't sure if you got one."

He starts to laugh as she rolls her eyes, then bites her bottom lip at him with a scowl and pulls back onto the road.

"I take it that's a yes?" he asks a few seconds later.

  
***

  
They can see the little carnival set up from a distance, probably for the Fourth of July.

Carnivals like this were not really things she got to do a lot of as a kid. There were lots of church carnivals, but nothing with horror houses and rides with dark tunnels.

As they park, Lola definitely attracts some attention, and they get a few curious glances, too.

Hunger is starting to set in, and although she's enjoyed driving and just talking, she's now craving the kind of amazing junk foods she knows exist at carnivals.

"No bobbing for apples here!" she says delightedly, as Coulson buys tickets and meets her in line for the funnel cakes.

Normally, she wouldn't think of letting Coulson buy her this, seeing as she's _his_ boss now, but nothing about this day has been her normal.

And he was insisting due to it being payback for the way her birthday had gone, and the space rescue, and for just being Daisy.

So she agreed quickly before she turned a different shade.

"Did you do a lot of that as a kid?" he asks, handing over tickets to her.

"Some. Also, jellybean counting, bean bag toss, the fish pond..." she ticks off on her fingers.

"That's no fun," he tells her, while she orders, leaning up to talk to the guy in the food truck. "No rides to make you throw up?"

"It sounds like there's a story there," she smiles through a mouthful of the cake as she steps back down.

It's so warm, and sweet, and _fried_. It's just like Heaven, she thinks, as she closes her eyes.

When she opens them she finds Coulson watching her, then glancing down at his shoes, before he takes off his sunglasses and puts them in his shirt pocket.

"That has to be one of the best funnel cakes ever made," he manages to say, before she holds it up to him.

"Here."

He delicately takes a piece off the end and then eats it, nodding his head at her in agreement, his eyes smiling at her all along.

This is definitely _not_ a normal day, but she's starting to slip, and not think of all the ways it could go wrong.

But first, she wants to hear Coulson's disgusting childhood carnival story.

Because something is bound to happen.

Just the probability alone. She's never calculated it, but she knows enough to know what she knows.

 

***

  
She jumps when she hears a scream, but then realizes it's from someone inside the House of Horrors ride.

It makes her laugh nervously and glance up at Coulson, who has put a hand on her arm, quiet as a mouse with all of the loud carnival sounds around them.

There are more people now that it's dark, and Coulson is done with the rides, is having a beer, and not wanting a repeat of his childhood story tonight.

At first she starts to wonder if she's bored him, all this time together not talking about stopping Watchdogs or fighting with alien governments about legal issues.

"I thought it might be nice to talk, preferably while not spinning rapidly in circles?" he says loudly over the noise, answering her thoughts.

"We could drive some more?" she suggests. "All these people have to live _somewhere_ nearby," she gets out before she loses her nerve. 

It _is_ getting dark, and if they did head back, they'd arrive pretty late. It's certainly doable, but other things also seem kind of doable, she thinks, feeling slightly guilty as Coulson looks at her innocently and pushes one of his rolled up sleeves up an arm.

Something inside of her is wanting to test fate.

Then there's another scream, this time at the Ferris Wheel. Coulson gives her one look, then follows after her as soon as he dumps his beer in the trash.

The teenager is hanging off the edge of the car at the top of the wheel, his feet dangling and kicking as he tries to pull himself back up.

Coulson gets everyone to back away, and then Daisy focuses her powers below, creating a cushion for his fall.

Behind her concentration, she hears what she expected to hear. A few mentions of _Inhuman_ , and _freak_.

She sees Coulson turn to give the authors a withering stare, but he talks to the kid, convinces him to let go, that she would never let anything happen to him.

That she's a superhero. _Phil._

When he's safe on the ground, she's surrounded and then Coulson is there, putting some room between her and the gathering crowd.

The teenager asks her to take a selfie with him, and then his friends.

Coulson smiles at her, then tells him it will cost them two beers.

Once they have them, they head back towards Lola and lean against her as the tiny little firework display starts.

"The last time we saw fireworks," she remembers. "I wasn't expecting to see you."

"I could barely stop seeing you," he answers, then takes a sip of his beer and looking embarrassed at the admission as light flashes against his face.

"Something did happen after all," she tells him.

"Yeah, you were a hero. If you hadn't been here tonight, it might have ended differently."

"That's not what I was talking about," she tells him, taking the beer out of his hand, and setting it on Lola's hood with hers.

Then she moves in closer to him, hesitating, slowly fitting herself against him cautiously, staring at the open vee of his shirt first. _Before_.

But then his fingers slide along her cheek, into her hair, and their mouths meet just as she lifts her chin.

She can hear the fireworks still going on above them, in pops and whizzes.

But there's no way they're more spectacular than Phil's kisses.

  
***

  
The motor inn actually has a tiny little pool that's heated.

Phil disappears for a minute, and comes back with a couple of towels and a bar of chocolate from the vending machine.

She laughs at the sentimentality of it, how charm always comes so easily to him, and takes a bite out of it as he holds it out to her, then pulls her t-shirt off over her head.

Maybe he isn't the kind of person who would go skinny dipping in an almost abandoned roadside inn after 11 pm?

But she turns away and follows through with it rather than second guess herself.

Her head goes under as she jumps in, and she pops out again to find him out of her line of sight, only to reappear above the surface, his t-shirt sticking to his body, his mouth tasting like chocolate.

"I couldn't fully commit," he says in a low voice, as he pauses between kisses.

She thinks about his scar, and that she's never seen it, and traces over the outline with her fingers through the wet cotton.

"That's okay," she answers, and then tugs at his bottom lip before she takes aim at his tongue, feeling him lift her in the water, trapping her body between his and the pool's side.

It was never going to work, not being attached to him. She tried hard for awhile, but he made it impossible.

And this, she thinks, as he grinds his hips up against hers, feels very, very possible.

When he was taken, again, when it almost felt like they'd never find him, it wasn't just about keeping the team together, although that means a lot to her.

"I thought I almost lost you," she tells him, looking into his eyes in the low light, the water reflecting off them.

"Never," he shakes his head. "I'm always with you. Here."

His fingers press against her chest where her heart is beating through it, then slide to cup her breast in his palm.

"Wow, that was almost romantic," she chuckles settling her arms around his neck.

"You can hardly blame me," he smiles against her mouth, before he kisses her again.

Phil, it seems, is a kissing enthusiast, with the kind of care and attention to detail he reserves for things like Lola and vintage watches.

She sits up higher against him and holds his face in her hands, sliding her lips along his chin, curling them around his ear.

"I could kiss you all night," she rasps into his ear, and feels him shiver.

"I could kiss you all over," he offers, with a shallow breath, and then ducks his head to look at her with his eyebrows raised in a question.

This is probably the best non-birthday that she can remember.

  
###

  
She was already awake, but she listens for a moment as the phones beep together, the alarm sounds in unison.

"You're needed, Director," she's told as she answers.

"Can you send the quinjet for us?" she says, trying to suppress a yawn.

"Ask for an ETA," Coulson whispers over her shoulder, then presses his lips against it.

"ETA?" she repeats, and then feels his teeth grazing her skin, and swallows as she gets a reply. "Copy that."

"We did make it 24 hours," Coulson tells her, rolling on his back and stretching, as she puts the phone back on the nightstand and pulls back the covers.

He reaches then snaps his prosthetic back into place and sits up in the bed with his arms on his knees, yawning deeply.

"You mean 24 hours and 40 minutes," she tells, him, walking towards the bathroom. "You look like you could use a shower, Agent."

"Is that an order?" he asks with a lopsided smile, standing up off the bed, following after her.

"Maybe?" she laughs as he gets his arms around her and guides them both inside.


End file.
